


A Lot Better

by twowritehands



Category: The Middle
Genre: Donaheck, M/M, Sexl
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-23
Updated: 2016-02-23
Packaged: 2018-05-22 20:22:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,255
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6092962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twowritehands/pseuds/twowritehands
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They kissed once. This is the aftermath.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Lot Better

**Author's Note:**

> Their ship name can be Sexl.
> 
> Come on, son.

**A Lot Better**

: : :

It’s weeks before they see each other again. Then months of acting casual before they talk about what they know. What they’ve been pretending they don't know. Pretending they don't think about.

Pretending they don't care.

Axl cares. It's hard to say why. His best friend and his first kiss. His first kiss and his best friend. Best friend. First kiss.

These labels roll through Axl, and they feel so weighed down with an unnamable, shimmering kind of significance. What used to be two separate kinds of significances are now all tangled together, which just makes them that much heavier.

And Sean cares, too. He knows why. For a while now--hell, maybe even years--he’s been on the edge of something. His mind sometimes glances off of it, like a stone across the top of water, when he’s having sex or when he’s drunk and always when he’s both.

_Guys are cute sometimes._

Before, Sean never thought this unless he was drunk or trying to get off or both, but now his mind is often on Axl Heck, his best friend. His first kiss. So cute.

It’s as if figuring out he has already kissed Axl Heck--and yet the world didn't end--has opened a door he has always passed by and always wondered about entering. It's now wide open and he’s on the threshold.

Axl is exceedingly glad they’ve gone back to normal, hanging like nothing ever happened. Bros. Solid. They talk about school and work and cars and sports and girls and possible tattoos and their families.

Hell, they talk about everything _but_ what Axl wants to talk about. Of course, he’s glad they don't talk about it, but at the same time he _wants_ to talk about it. (Yeah, it gives Axl a headache, too.) He wants to, doesn't want to, wants to talk about their kiss.

He was twelve and stupid and totally missed in the dark. His first try got her--no Sean--on the side of the nose. But then fingers touched his chin and then their lips met and Axl totally froze like a dork, then they were scrambling to get out of that closet and… He’s gotten _a lot_ better, okay?

That’s what he wants to say. Again. He said it that day, but he hasn't gotten to say it again, and he feels like he should. He wants to make sure that Sean _knows_ that twenty one year old Axl Heck is waaaay better at kissing than twelve year old Axl Heck.

Why? Because Sean Donahue is good at everything--even his first kiss, which Axl now knows intimately as a _fact_. Because that was smooth as hell of Sean, the way he held Axl’s chin and kissed him so soundly. Axl wants Donahue to know he’s a natural, too. It was just nerves that time. He doesn't get nervous anymore. He doesn't.

Sean, meanwhile, loves hanging out with Axl when they’re both in Orson. Of all the friends he's making at Notre Dame none of them have been his friend as long as Axl Heck. Sean feels blessed to have such a long-grown friendship.

And it's amazing, the way an old friendship can feel _brand new._ In a lot of ways, Sean feels like he’s just getting to know the guy he’s always known. Axl isn't just cool and funny and good at sports anymore. He’s cool, funny, good at sports, cute and _sweet_. He’s more than cute, he’s down right gorgeous with those eyes and that hair and his defined Adam’s apple bobbing up and down in his pale throat and those little freckles across his nose…

“Three years of going to different colleges and we’re still best friends,” Sean says out of the blue one day.

“Yep,” Axl chirps, “Friends for life, dude.” They’re in a food court at the mall. Axl has a double bacon and fries. Sean has a vegan baked potato.

“It means I can trust you,” Sean continues. “And you can trust me.”

“Yeah,” Axl agrees, shoving finger fulls of fries into his mouth.

Sean considers leaving it there. What good can it do to plow ahead and make things weird again? At this point, he really doesn't want to go weeks without seeing Axl, like last time.

They finish their food and head back to the front of the mall. As they walk, Axl’s shoulder bumps Sean’s once… twice… then the backs of their hands graze.

Sean stops at a sunglasses stand. Axl does too. They casually try on a few pairs.

Axl has on some ray bans and is pushing on the stems behind his ears to make them flop up and down over his eyes. Whenever his eyes are visible he’s got them super wide or crossed or hooded or rolled back to show the whites. Sean grins as he watches, it's so cute. He blurts, “I wanna kiss you again.”

“Okay,” Axl says.

And they’re kissing. Holy _cow_ are they kissing.

Axl has thought about this, so it is _on._ He shows Donahue what he’s got. All the tricks in his bag. Or, the ones he can manage, anyway.

It turns out kissing a guy is different than kissing a girl. For one thing, they both show up with their tongues right away so Axl can't do that cool bottom lip swipe thing he knows girls like. It’s just like, bam, right away, tongue. And a lot of it.

Axl brushes Sean’s long hair behind an ear and holds him by the back of the head even while learning that Sean is kind of _bitey_ which--whoa--is pretty good and then Sean scoops Axl right up against him with an arm around his waist. Girls aren't usually so much taller and bigger than Axl so _that’s_ new enough to make him breathless. Plus, somehow for all his thinking about this moment, Axl has never factored in beard bristles. He isn't prepared for how much he _likes_ it.

Sean gets a tantalizing rush when Axl opens his mouth right away and then holds him by the back of the head with one hand, the other touching his bearded jaw. He delights in how great Axl fits in the cook of one arm and against him. How Axl kisses back like he’s chasing oxygen. How Axl sighs with a grunt.

When the kissing breaks naturally, Axl realizes his heels weren't even on the ground when he finds himself being sat back down on them. _What_?

Sean is holding his sides, thumbing the bones at the wings of his hips. “No complaints?” he asks with this adorable smile.

Axl’s voice is wobbly with nervous laughter, and he doesn't know where to put his hands so on Sean’s biceps is as good as any place. “Uh, no. Nope. Zero. You?”

“None.” Sean winks, “ _Even though_ you taste like bacon.”

Axl laughs and quirks an eyebrow, “Ah, you know you liked it.”

“I did,” Sean intones, squeezing Axl’s hips, “Might not be vegan.”

“Might not be straight either,” Axl stage whispers.

“Oh, God, no, not straight. No.” Sean bats a hand like it’s that easy. And maybe it is. Axl can't think why he ever thought it wouldn't be. He laughs merrily.

“We’re good?” Sean asks.

“We’re best friends,” Axl waves a hand, too, “We’ll always be good.”

Sean, grinning, dips in and pecks him on the lips, “Good.”

Axl pushes his fingers in between Sean’s and they hold hands out to the car.


End file.
